Palermo's Urban Pie

Brand Relaunch Campaign

CHALLENGE

Palermo’s, makers of fine frozen pizzas since 1954, is able to compete bite-for-bite against national pizza goliaths like Kraft General Foods – and rightfully so. Have you tasted it? These guys crush the competition on flavor. Their new ultra-premium Urban Pie variety was no exception.

The problem was, their initial launch campaign for the new brand failed to breakthrough and compel shoppers in the frozen aisle. Once bitten and twice shy, they came to SRH to serve up a more impactful go-to-market campaign and deliver a validated creative approach before rolling it out big. (You ordered puns on this, right?)

SOLUTION

We started with the same question we always do: Who will buy this and why? Urban Pie is a delicious line of $10 frozen pizzas with elevated ingredients like chicken sausage and roasted yellow peppers – yummy to everyone but the kind of thing that might appeal to the more sophisticated palate.

We found the answer by digging into data from Nielson and the brand’s social media accounts. This pie was made to order for urban-dwelling, millennial females who want craft pizza without leaving home. The kind of pizza lover who doesn’t have time for delivery and doesn’t want the caloric intake of a linebacker. We decided to name our buyer persona “Jenny.”

Our testing strategy was to produce the kind of creative Jenny would respond to, creating three distinct campaigns and serving them up via highly targeted video ads on Facebook and Instagram. Then, we watched and waited to see which creative would bubble up and rise to the top.

“Tasty meets Easy” – because Jenny might not own a cookbook, but she does get recipes from Tasty videos.

“Pizza Match” (the app that connects you with your pizza soulmate) – because Jenny doesn’t peruse the personal ads but she does swipe on dating apps.

Within 60 days of launching our campaigns, we gathered the data and the validation the Palermo’s team had been looking for.

We further refined our target audience, which led to a more precise and efficient distribution strategy.

We proved a winning creative concept: “Pizza Match.”

We drove awareness and buzz with a national yet targeted audience.

IMPACT

Ultimately, we scaled “Pizza Match” into a much larger integrated campaign that properly launched the brand and established a new model for future launches at Palermo’s. Jennys everywhere were introduced to their new favorite pizza and came back for seconds again and again.